How Islam led to the Dark Ages.
by Bill Federer, The American Minute
Caliph Umar fought alongside of Mohammed in nearly all his battles. Umar’s daughter Hafsa was one of Mohammed’s wives. Waging jihad, Umar conquered enormous areas, including: -Eastern Roman Empire, Mesopotamia, parts of Persia, Egypt, Palestine, Syria, North Africa, Armenia, Anatolia, Damascus, and Jerusalem.
Muslim pirates terrorized the Mediterranean, blockading trade. This caused an economic disaster in Roman Europe by diminishing products moving from North Africa and the Middle East to Rome. An important item no longer shipped was papyrus — reeds from the Nile delta which were used for paper in Europe.
The sudden shortage of paper resulted in a decline of writing, literacy, and fewer books being written. This was a key factor in the beginning of THE DARK AGES.
The world’s largest and oldest library was in Alexandria, Egypt. Accounts were given by: Persian traveler Abd-Al-Latif of Baghdad (1162-1231), Jamal Ad-din Al-Kufti (1169-1248), and Syrian prelate Bar Hebraeus (1226-1286) that when Caliph Omar was asked in 642 AD what to do with the books in the library, he told his commander Amr bin al-Ass:
“Touching the books you mention, if what is written in them agrees with the Qur’an, they are not required; if it disagrees, they are not desired. Destroy them therefore.”
The account continued that the library books were burned to heat the city’s bath-houses for six months. Other libraries in Babylon, Syria and Greece met similar fates.
Current accounts, such as Breitbart News, April 13, 2016, reported this behavior continuing: “ISIS militants also raided the Central Library of Mosul to destroy all non-Islamic books. “These books promote infidelity and call for disobeying Allah,” announced a militant to the residents. “So they will be burned.”
In 711 AD, Muslim jihad crusaders crossed the Strait of Gibraltar and conquered all of Spain. Pope Gregory III put out a plea for help and Charles Martel stopped the Islamic advance just outside of Paris at the Battle of Tours in 732 AD, just 100 years after the death of Mohammed in 632 AD.
In 832 AD, Muslim Caliph Al-Ma’mun of the Abbasid Dynasty ordered raiders to seek out Pharaohs’ tombs for plundering. They broke into the Great Pyramid of Giza in search of treasure. The destruction of Egyptian history was so thorough that within a few generations, Egyptians had no memory of who built the Great Pyramids.
An Islamic Hadiths stated: “Abu’l-Hayyaj al-Asadi told that ‘Ali (b. Abu Talib) said to him … Do not leave an image without obliterating it, or a high grave without leveling it. This hadith has been reported by Habib with the same chain of transmitters and he said: Do not leave a picture without obliterating it.” (Hadith Bk 4, No. 2115)
As the “rightly guided” Muslim Caliphs conquered North Africa and the Middle East, it further interrupted Mediterranean trade, economically devastating Rome and Byzantium.
In 846 AD, just 46 years after Charlemagne was crowned Holy Roman Emperor in Rome’s old St. Peter’s basilica, 11,000 Muslim attacked. They sacked Rome, looted old St. Peter’s basilica and St. Paul Outside the Wall Church, desecrating the graves of both St. Peter and St. Paul.
As a result, Pope Leo IV built a wall, 39 feet high, all around the Vatican to keep the Muslim invaders out. It took four years to complete the wall. In 849 AD, Muslims Saracen raiders set sail from Sardina with a fleet to invade Rome.
Pope Leo rallied the cities of Amalfi, Gaeta and Naples to send ships to block the mouth of the Tiber River near Ostia. Muslims attacked. The fighting was fierce, when suddenly a violent storm arose, dividing the Christians fleet from the Muslim attackers in the Battle of Ostia.
Christian ships were able to make it back to port and weather the storm, but the Muslim ships were severely damaged and scattered. When the storm subsided, the remaining Muslim ships were easily captured.
In 1009 when “Mad Caliph” Al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah, ordered the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem destroyed. Pilgrims returning from the Holy Land shared reports of Muslim persecution and cruelty toward “dhimmi” Christians.
In 1057, the Norman adventurer Robert Guiscard took control of Calabria in the “toe of Italy” and fought against the Muslims of Sicily.
In 1071, the Muslims delivered a major defeat to the Byzantine Christians at the Battle of Manzikert and took control of all but the coastlands of Asia Minor.
In desperation, the Byzantine Emperor Alexius I Comnenus humbled himself and sent ambassadors to the Council of Piacenza in March of 1095, appealing for help from his religious rival, the Roman Catholic Pope.
With Spain exuberant after driving the Muslims from Toledo and Leon by 1085, Pope Urban II gave an impassioned plea at the Council of Clermont in 1095 for Western leaders to help their Byzantine Christians brethren, whom Muslims “compel to extend their necks and then, attacking them with naked swords, attempt to cut through the neck with a single blow.” (Robert the Monk, Medieval Sourcebook, Fordham University.)
The First Crusade began in 1097. In the next two centuries there were a total of 9 major Crusades to return the Holy Land to its pre-Islamic inhabitants.
After the Crusades ended, in the 1300s, the Muslim jihad conqueror Tamerlane killed 17 million across central Asia, annihilating Christianity and leaving pyramids of skulls in Delhi, India.
In 1400s, as Muslims invaded Byzantium. When the Ottoman Muslims sacked Constantinople in 1453, it ended the land trade routes from Europe to India and China which led Columbus to looking for a sea route, beginning THE AGE OF DISCOVERY.
As Ottoman Muslims invaded Greece Byzantine Empire, they destroyed churches, libraries, museums, artwork, and graves of the Christian Saints. Greeks scholars fled west to Florence, Italy, reintroducing their Greek art, architecture and philosophy to western Europe.
This led to a flood of Greek treasures, art and literature hurriedly carried to Florence, Italy. This re-interest in Greek culture is called THE RENAISSANCE.
In retrospect, Islam was instrumental in bringing about “The Dark Ages” when they conquered Egypt, cut off trade across the Mediterranean and held back the ships of papyrus; and Islam was instrumental in “The Renaissance” when they invaded Greece and destroyed Greek culture, causing scholars to flee to Italy. Greek scholars also fled west with their Greek New Testaments and ancient Biblical manuscripts.
In fact, the very concepts of “Europe” and “Christendom” took shape in response to the Islamic invasion, as previously Europe viewed itself as innumerable independent kingdoms.
Later notable battles against the Ottomans include:
* Siege of Malta, September 11, 1565;
* Battle of Lepanto, October 7, 1571;
* Battle of Vienna, September 11, 1683;
* Battle of Zenta, September 11, 1697.
Today, fundamental Muslims also destroyed:
-City of Ani in Armenia;
-Buddhist statues in Afghanistan;
-Assyrian Museum;
-Egyptian rioters trashing mummies;
-Ancient Syrian and Chaldean churches dating back to the time of the Apostles;
-Ayotollah Khomeini’s attempt to destroy Cyrus’ ancient Persian palace at Persepolis;
-the graves of the Prophet Jonah and the Prophet Daniel in Nineveh (Mosul, Iraq) were blown up by ISIS militants on July 24, 2014.